


Sea Songs

by theherocomplex



Series: Distant Shores and Voices [13]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Romance, impending parenthood, post-Inquisition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-03
Updated: 2016-01-03
Packaged: 2018-05-11 07:17:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5618008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theherocomplex/pseuds/theherocomplex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>More than one new life waits for Hawke and Fenris.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sea Songs

**Author's Note:**

> All inspiration belongs to onemooncircles, and many, many thanks belong to kindervenom, whose own work helped me shape this little moment. 
> 
> This ficlet takes place a few months before the events of Trespasser, but involves no spoilers for that DLC.

Skyhold had a great deal to recommend it — Isabela and Varric, specifically, and Fenris had delighted in sparring with the Lady Seeker — but Hawke finds she vastly prefers Starkhaven. Perhaps it's the smell of the sea, riding the edge of every breeze; perhaps it's the quiet, ordered castle and its gentle routines.

Perhaps — and Hawke thinks this is the key — it's the steady contentment Fenris has radiated since they arrived, the fierce satisfaction in his gaze as he drills the soldiers in the practice fields. If she asked, he would spend all day with her in their chambers, tumbling in and out of bed as they relearned each other, but she has no right to swallow down whole this hard-won life of his. So she wakes with him as he rises before dawn, tightens his vambraces when he dresses, and kisses him, once, twice, three times, before letting him out the door.

Then, she can fall back into bed, curl into the sleep-warm hollow he left behind, and doze until the sun fully rises and Orana brings up breakfast for them to share.

This morning, Orana brings the usual tray of bread and jam, of eggs and cheese, but she brings oranges too, with a slight, sly smile as Hawke claps her delight.

"Oh, you are an _angel_ ," she says, swinging her legs over the side of the bed. She stands slowly on sore, swollen feet, and pads to the table. Orana coaxes her into the most comfortable chair, and tucks a blanket over her lap before Hawke waves her to her own seat. "Oh, really, I don't need all this fuss, Orana. Sit down, start eating — here, let me get your tea."

"Thank you, Mistress," Orana says, taking her cup in both hands. Before Hawke can tell her, for the hundredth time, not to call her _Mistress_ any longer, she looks up with a shy smile. "How are you feeling today?"

"I feel…" Hawke sighs. She can't reach the jam jar with her belly bumping against the edge of the table, swollen and heavy, and oh, Maker, she's been pregnant for a thousand years, and she's going to be pregnant for a thousand more. "Like a sausage, if I'm being perfectly honest."

Orana giggles, covering her mouth with one hand, and nudges the jam a little closer. "You've only three months to go, Mistress," she says, smiling over the rim of her cup. "Isn't that what the healers said?"

Hawke nods, her knife over the jam jar. "Three months," she says solemnly. "Also known as, _a thousand years_."

They both giggle over their breakfast then. As Orana tells Hawke about her apprenticeship with the court composer, she peels the tiny, bright oranges for them to share. Hawke leans back in her seat, absently touching the curve of her belly. She smells the bitter salt of the sea, mingled with the sweet-sharp scent of the oranges, and wonders if their baby — the baby she and Fenris made, the one sleeping so warm and content under her heart — will recognize it, when they're finally born.

 

***

 

The herb-strewn water feels heavenly on her belly, and her breasts, and her back — every inch of her, really, but most of all on her feet, which she hasn't even seen for a month. But all the aches and worries are leagues away as Hawke floats, and dozes, waiting for Fenris to come home.

The door to the bedroom creaks open. Hawke smiles to herself as a familiar pair of footsteps enters, but doesn't rise. Not that she _could,_ without assistance.

"Hawke?" Fenris calls. The sound of his armor being hung on its frame follows his words, and Hawke waits until the noises fade before she answers.

"In the bath, love. Sorry, but it's gone all slippery in here, and —"

Fenris' voice cuts across hers. "Stay where you are, I'm coming."

Hawke lets her head fall back against the wall, still smiling. "You're so attractive when you're aggressively nurse-maiding me. Have I ever told you that?"

"Once or twice," says Fenris, suddenly at her ear. She jumps, water splashing around her breasts, and opens her eyes to find him at her side. Stripped to the waist, too, his hair tied back, and rolling his eyes as she gives him an admiring look.

"Oh, go ahead, roll your eyes," she says, shifting to make room for him in the tub. "But you look…" Words fail her, briefly, as Fenris bends down and brushes a kiss to her forehead. "It's good to see you," she says, and oh, she _means_ it. Sometimes, she thinks she'll never get her fill of looking at Fenris. She thought it before, in Kirkwall, but that was before —

 _Don't cry_ , she tells herself sternly, shutting her eyes against the tears already prickling under her lids. _You may be pregnant, but that's no reason to get all teary._

"Hawke?" Fenris' fingers move through her hair, teasing out the frowsy tangles. "Is all well?" Before she can reassure him, he pushes forward, his voice tight with worry. "Sebastian said one of the healers came up this afternoon, did they — "

"Oh, Fenris, no, everything is fine." She clutches at his fingers, squeezing as he sighs. "I'm sorry, I — yes, the healer _was_ here, but I wasn't expecting her. She had some herbs for the bath."

Fenris sighs again, and kneels next to the bathtub, without letting go of her hand. "All is well," he says, the question thrumming under his words.

Hawke nods. With her free hand, she tugs his hair free from its leather thong, and runs her fingers through the sweat-darkened strands. "All is _very_ well," she says, and leans in for a kiss. Before their lips meet, she pauses, and smiles. "Apart from me being as big as a bloody house."

Fenris' eyes go wide, then he rocks back on his heels, groaning. "Hawke —"

"We _agreed_ ," she says, flicking water at him. "I'm the one who feels like she's got a dragon sleeping on her bladder, I get to complain all I want."

The edge of a grin is all she sees before Fenris takes her head in both hands and kisses her quiet. "We did," he says, once he's left her safely breathless. "But if you truly _were_ pregnant with a dragon, you'd be ecstatic."

Hawke opens her mouth to deny the charge — but if Fenris isn't _right_ , he's _half-right_ , and she has more planned for this evening than a light-hearted argument. "You know me so well," she says, and kisses him again. "Now, this bathtub is conspicuously lacking a handsome elf."

Fenris gives the herbs floating along the surface of the water a dubious look. "What kind of herbs are these?" he asks, as he strokes his knuckles along the line of her neck. To an outsider's eye, Hawke knows the gesture looks like absent-minded affection, but she knows far better — Fenris is quite aware of the effect that _any_ of his touches will have on her. She shivers, in spite of the water's heat, as his fingers slip over her collarbone.

"Just to soften the skin, and make it easier to sleep." When he still looks doubtful, Hawke shifts tactics. "The water's hot, and I know the practice fields were anything but. And if you get in, I'll scrub you down."

"Tempting." The edge of his grin opens into a full, rare smile. "I accept your invitation."

Hawke watches as he sheds his trousers, her mouth going dry as always at the cut of his hips and the hard muscles in his thighs, but she keeps her hands to herself as he steps into the water. For all his protesting, Fenris sighs with clear relief as he sits down, and Hawke takes the momentary quiet to boost herself onto the bathtub's wide ledge.

"There," she says, reaching for the soap. "Soak your head."

Fenris dips his head under the water obediently, and comes up spluttering. Water streams down his back, through the sweat and grime, and he leans back against the wall of the tub, his wet head lolling against her bare leg. Hawke scoops soap from the dish and begins a lather at the crown of his head, working her way down his neck and across his shoulders with steady, circular squeezes. Fenris sighs, and sighs, and sinks lower in the tub, until Hawke's belly keeps her from reaching any farther.

"Maker," she wheezes, sitting up to catch her breath. "I'm massive."

Fenris shakes water out of his face, and turns around to smile at her. "You're beautiful," he says, one hand cupping her ankle, and Hawke's breath is gone for an entirely new set of reasons. "Never doubt it."

"I've got no reason to, with you around," she says, feeling a flush begin at her cheeks and move down her neck, and over her chest. His hand squeezes tight around her ankle, as they watch each other, the warm air and warmer water cradling them sweetly in the silence.

"Well," she says, in almost a whisper. "We should — we should probably talk about names. Whether or not it's a dragon in there, it'll need a name."

"Hm." Fenris turns around, kissing the inside of her knee. "A fair point. Do you have one in mind?"

"Oh, several." Hawke turns her attention back to his left shoulder, where the muscles always knot, and digs in with her thumb. Fenris hisses, but relaxes into her ministrations. "I was thinking, if it's a boy, why not Varric Sebastian?"

Fenris snorts, just as she knew he would, and stretches out in the water. "I am _not_ letting you name our child after Varric," he says. "He needs no help keeping his ego inflated."

"So, Sebastian Varric, then?"

"Hawke, I will leave this bathtub."

"Oh, _fine_." She pouts. "Well, what are your ideas, then? Dazzle me with your brilliant choices."

He's silent long enough to make her think he's fallen asleep — then he shifts, and clears his throat. "Baby," he says, at last.

Hawke blinks. "Baby," she repeats. "You would name our baby… _Baby_."

Fenris shrugs.

Even when she _can_ see his face, it's hard enough to tell when Fenris is joking, and right now she can't lean forward far enough to get the tiniest glimpse."Oh, for — Fenris!" Hawke bursts out laughing. "Tell me you're not serious."

"It's perfectly acceptable —"

"It's just a noun! It's not a name!"

"That's rather elitist of you," Fenris says, but his shoulders are shaking with barely-suppressed laughter, and Hawke relaxes, even as she threads her fingers into his hair and give it a light tug.

"I'll give you elitist," she says, knowing it makes no sense even as the words come out of her mouth. Before she can think of something else to say, something that makes her sound like not quite so much of an idiot, something flutters deep within her, and —

 _Oh._ The movement crests, like the tide as it carries in the grey-silver fish, the ropy seaweed, all the rich clusters of life that live beneath the waters.

Hawke inhales, the sharp herbs forgotten, the sea in her lungs and her child under her heart.

 _Hello, little one,_ she thinks, tears pricking at her eyes _. There you are._

"Hawke?"

She blinks, and finds Fenris watching her, dark brows drawn together. What must she look like, stunned and speechless, her hands moving over her belly, hungry to feel that tiny life again?

"Hawke?" Fenris asks again, worry creeping into his voice. "Are you all right?"

She laughs, watery and awed, and grabs his hand. "She's awake," she says, holding his hand in place. He has to feel it too, he has to _know_. "Look, Fenris, do you feel it?" Hawke knows she's babbling, but she can't seem to stop, and neither can their child, kicking and shifting as if her parents' laughter woke her from her long dreaming. "She's awake, Fenris."

He touches her so carefully, so unlike the way he touches her in bed, when his hands seek out her belly or hair with such ease. "Just," Hawke says, "she'll move again — there! There she is."

"She," he says, in a choked, bewildered voice. "You — you know this?"

Hawke nods. She'd planned to tell him, once they were in bed, warm and half-asleep, but it's so much better now, to watch it dawn on his face as he feels their daughter move within her. "We're having a daughter," Hawke adds. "A little girl." And then, of course, she starts to cry, in helpless, happy sobs, because it's finally come to her: she's alive, Fenris brought her home, and nothing would be so cruel as to make her think she would have this much, and then take it all away. She gets to _stay._

"A girl," he whispers, and lets out a quiet breath. "Hawke, a _girl_."

She nods, knuckling away her tears and trying to smile. Their daughter moves, slower now, but just as steady. "She needs a name," she says. "So if you've got any ideas for girls —"

"Mairwen," Fenris says, and then stops, as if he's startled himself into silence with his boldness.

Hawke swallows, dimly aware the water is cooling on her bare skin. She doesn't mind. "Mairwen," she says, testing the word on her tongue, and finds herself smiling as it floats into the air. "It's lovely," she says. "Is there…a reason?"

He shrugs, suddenly shy, and looks down at his hand on her belly. "I heard it, a long time ago," he says, carefully. "Someone was calling it. I can't remember where. It sounded beautiful. I —" He hesitates, and Hawke takes the opportunity to cover his hand with hers.

"It's perfect," she says, and means it. "Mairwen. Our daughter, Mairwen."

Fenris' smile blazes, star-hot, as the sea tide within Hawke fades into sleepy patience again. Their daughter rests, waiting to be born.


End file.
